>> Hello and welcome to inside
Indiana Business. It has been
years in the making and now a
unique partnership between
Bloomington based Cook medical
and goodwill industries bringing
home on the near northeast side
of Indianapolis. A $15 million
medical device manufacturing
facility will meet jobs, create
education and community
ownership with more on the new
manufacturing investment please
to welcome back Cook Medical and
Cook group president Pete. Pete,
welcome.
>> Great to be with you again.
>> Want to talk about this
unique investment in a moment
but you have got the device, the
medical device that will be
manufactured at that facility
with you. Let us see that device
and what it's about. Why you're
doing it at this new facility.
>> Yeah. I have that here. Well,
this is a product that
unfortunately has been in high
demand for us over the last few
years called a blue rhino
percutaneous tracheostomy device
that allows people to come off a
trach tube. People who are
having trouble breathing or off
and on a ventilator and have a
tube down their throat, through
their vocal cords and causes a
lot of distress. This allows
physicians to go in a more
invasive way to allow breathing
for patients. It's been in high
demand. We'll be happy when the
demand goes back to normal for
this product.
>> An important product about
this northeast side Indianapolis
plant. But this is an investment
that really goes beyond the
dollars, the jobs and the
opportunity there. But this is
about really supporting a
community in so many ways. Talk
about the idea, the model behind
this. This is about folks in the
community being the employees
there and taking literally
ownership of the whole project.
>> Yeah. This building is
obviously a beautiful new state
of the art medical device
manufacturing facility, but so
much more than that. It means
100 new jobs for people in the
community. I talked to the
employees, many are walking,
riding their bike to work. Right
in the middle of the community.
People have access to free
education. Goodwill are run and
operate this facility, which
means they bring their wrap
around services, life coaches,
people can help them coordinate
schedules, give them a license,
find a place to live out of
prison. It's a wholistic
approach to how can we be part
of a community and build up the
skills and resources that people
need to make this community a
successful place.
>> Yeah. As part of this, too,
there's a grocery store that
you're building in the area
there that will support the area
that will ultimately be owned
and operated by a couple of area
entrepreneurs, neighborhood
etrepreneurs. That's an
important piece of this as well.
>> No doubt. So what we learned
from being in the community, the
area we're in is a food desert.
There's 100,000 people who don't
have easy access to a grocery
store. All five big box stores
left in the last five years.
People are going to gas stations
to find food. They can't find
fruits and vegetables. From a
business perspective, you can't
have a work force that can't
have easy access to food but you
can't have a community that
doesn't have access to food. We
partnered with two local
entrepreneurs who dry up in the
community. They were trying to
build a grocery stores, a few
years into it they were
struggling, couldn't get a
supply chain. We know about
supply chain. And we're going to
be having a brand-new grocery
store 15,000 square foot full
service grocery store next to
our manufacturing plant in the
middle of the community and
going to be owned and operated
by two local entrepreneurs. If
everybody brings their best, we
bring our skills and they bring
theirs, community brings
resources, we can solve these
problems, these obstacles are
not too big to overcome. These
barriers can be broken down and
we have seen that with these
partnerships we have.
>> Yeah and I guess to
underscore, you mentioned this
earlier, but the employees, it's
a diverse work force from the
immediate area. You met those
goals of really having it all
from the immediate area there so
that impact and it's estimated
$26 million that extends beyond
the neighborhood but so much
will be right there nearby.
>> Tens of millions of dollars
of economic input back into a
community that have not seen
investment, not seen opportunity
like this before. You know, you
talked about the work force.
People are coming from the
neighborhood. Some are walking.
You can be integrated into the
community, not just driving off
somewhere to do a job. We set a
goal of reaching 100% minority
contractors on the build of this
facility. We reached that. And I
think that's another important
part. We have dozens of people
now who are able to come into
the construction industy who
had never been in before and
they're on their pathway to high
paying careers because if you
think about it locally, and try
to include the local community,
you can get people on a path
ward to upper mobility.
>> I think a lot of folks will
be watching the progress of this
unique partnership. It is
interesting indeed and can have